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CNN in Crisis Over Occupy Fizzle

RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, the last time I played a sound bite featuring all-female anchors at CNN, I referred to it as "the clucking hens." This did not sit well with a young blogger at the Washington Post who had never heard the term and thought that (I don't remember the exact word) it was despicable of me so soon after the Sandra Fluke thing to refer to achieved, accredited female anchors as waterfowl -- uh, domestic fowl, domestic fowl. Chickens. My mother and her friends were known affectionately to me as the Blue-Haired Bloody Mary Gang, and I referred to them as "clucking hens."

This is a term of endearment that husbands since the cave days have used to describe it when their wives or girlfriends get together: Clucking hens. They sit there and they chat and they talk and so forth. But this was instructive for me 'cause this person (who had to be young) had never heard the term, thought it was outrageous, thought it was insulting and just violated every tenet of political correctness. "Why, how dare anybody say something like that! Here are achieved women. They've reached the pinnacle of something. They're anchors at CNN. And they're better than clucking hens." So I'm going to try to learn from this. I will not call them "clucking hens."

But we do have another sound bite of these women. Who is it? It's Carol Costello, who it has been said CNN has assigned to stalk me, journalistically, and [Katharine] "Poppy" Harlow. Now, that's a new name. I don't watch CNN so I don't know who "Poppy" Harlow is. But anyway, this happened on CNN's Newsroom this morning. And we have a montage here of Carol Costello and correspondent Poppy Harlow, not to be confused with the actress Poppy Montgomery of some primetime TV show. It's Poppy Harlow in this case. And they are in crisis over the Occupy protests fizzling out. They're devastated. They're terribly upset that they're not working. And here is that montage...

COSTELLO: They're back! This was their show of strength less than six months ago. (Swoosh!) And this is their fizzled fury today. This is a live picture of a modest turnout in New York City. (Swoosh!) CNN's Poppy Harlow is in New York's Bryant Park. Not many people there.

HARLOW: Not many people here. It's early. They tell me it's gonna get a lot busier this afternoon. Uh, it's a very small turnout, 40 people representing a movement.

COSTELLO: It's raining and it's cold and maybe later on in the day more people will gather. If there's not a huge turnout in these 135 cities across the United States, what will that say about the movement itself?

HARLOW: It hurts them. I think they need this to be a day when they really are visual all over the media.

RUSH: These are news reporters advising this group what they need to do in order to be taken seriously. They need this day to be a big day when they are really visual all over the media. Now, this reminds me of the old days of the NOW gang, the NAGs. (Probably a lot of people don't appreciate that nomenclature). But the NAGs would call a March or so and ten of them would show up and every network would be there. Ten women marching against whatever. Every network would be there covering it.

Now, the responsible view of this is, "Okay, if Occupy Wall Street -- this giant, big Occupy movement -- calls a protest today, and only 40 people show up, is it worth sending your news van? Is it worth sending your news van and your satellite up-link and your reporter to cover this thing? Of course not! It's a nonevent (that they want to be a bigger event). And so Poppy Harlow was telling Carol Costello what Occupy needs to do to be taken seriously by CNN this afternoon 'cause this morning was an embarrassing fizzle.

Who's on the phones? Mike in Cleveland. Thank you for waiting, Mike. It's great to have you on the program. Hi.

CALLER: Rush, thank you very much for the call. You've been actually a really good source of motivation. I'm really glad I got through today.

RUSH: Thank you, sir.

CALLER: Yeah, I just wanted to say, I'm here in Cleveland. Obviously, you have heard about the group of people trying to blow up the bridge here.

RUSH: Yeah, they're being characterized in the media that we're seeing "right-wingers."

CALLER: No, they were actual members of the Occupy movement.

RUSH: Of course. They're leftist anarchists.

CALLER: Yeah, and it has been verified. Our local news reported on it, and someone actually from the Occupy Cleveland movement, the head of it, confirmed that they were members of it. But they said, of course, that their actions were in no way representative of their beliefs or the way that they do things.

RUSH: How many were there?

CALLER: It was five total. They bought these fake explosives from one of the undercover FBI agents. Some of them were confirmed members of the Occupy movement. So I don't know what these other two are. I don't know if you've seen their pictures, but they...

RUSH: Well, we looked at their Facebook pages and on their Facebook pages they say that they were at Occupy Cleveland.

CALLER: Yeah. So what's your definition of Breaking News for MSNBC? 'Cause if these guys were actually a member of an extreme right-wing terror group or an extreme right-wing group, that would be MSNBC's version of Breaking News.

RUSH: Well, what happened in that case is that MSNBC would blow up the bridge --

CALLER: (laughing)

RUSH: -- and then claim that the Occupy guys did it, if they were right-wingers.

CALLER: So, yeah, I've been watching, and, no, they're conveniently leaving out that they are in fact members of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

RUSH: She gets dispatched to Bryant Park where there are 40 Occupiers not doing anything, yet in Cleveland five of 'em get close to blowing up a bridge. That's where the real news was and Poppy's in Bryant Park --

CALLER: Yep.

RUSH: -- chatting with Carol Costello about what they have to do to get noticed. The Bryant Park people forgot to blow something up.

CALLER: Yep.

RUSH: They are sending cornstarch, however, to banks and buildings, trying to make it look like it's anthrax or something. So they're sending cornstarch out there. By the way, his reference to MSNBC, in case you missed it: About 40 minutes ago, MSNBC had a chyron on the bottom 25% of the screen, the bottom fourth of the screen. Honestly, folks, we couldn't make this up. I doubt some of the best satirical writers at the Onion could have done this. Scott Ott might have been able to get close. MSNBC actually ran a giant headline at the bottom of the screen that said, "Breaking News! Osama Bin Laden Killed One Year Ago Today!"